Kobasew taking demotion to AHL in stride

WILKES-BARRE TWP. - The newest member of the Wilkes-Barre/Scranton Penguins stopped for a minute as he entered the Mohegan Sun Arena on Wednesday morning, introducing himself to the arena employee who was manning the door near the locker room.

"Hi, I'm Chuck," said winger Chuck Kobasew, extending his hand.

Kobasew has scored 110 goals in 600 career NHL games. He played in the Stanley Cup finals for the Calgary Flames in 2004. He hasn't been in the minor leagues in nine years.

But for now, he's Chuck, trying to get promoted to the NHL just like anyone else in the Penguins locker room.

"I'm treating it the same," Kobasew said. "I played half a year my first year pro and I played the lockout year in Lowell. I've played in the American League enough to know what the league's about. It's going to be fun to play with these guys and try to make a playoff push."

Kobasew, a 5-foot-11, 198-pound 12th year pro, signed with Pittsburgh after attending NHL training camp as a tryout. He scored in his first two games with the parent Penguins, then went 30 games without a point. When Pittsburgh acquired forwards Lee Stempniak and Marcel Goc at the trade deadline last week, Kobasew cleared waivers and was assigned to Wilkes-Barre/Scranton.

The organization gave him a few days to get his family squared away, and now he's preparing for his first AHL action since 2005.

"It's another great example for our young guys, but it's also a guy who's going to come in and be a real impact for our team," coach John Hynes said.

Will that impact be felt on the scoreboard or in other ways? That remains an open question.

In his younger days, Kobasew was a big-time scorer. He was a point-per-game performer in one year of college hockey at Boston College and one year of major junior hockey with Kelowna of the Western Hockey League. He had 38 goals in 79 games for the Lowell Lock Monsters in 2004-05 in his only full season in the AHL.

Most impressively, he had three 20-goal seasons in the NHL for Calgary and Boston from 2006-09.

For the past five NHL seasons, on the other hand, Kobasew hasn't hit double digits in goals. He's used his speed and grit to play a more blue-collar role among a team's bottom six forwards.

Kobasew knows his NHL future likely lies in a checking role. Still, he wouldn't mind using his AHL stay to rediscover his scoring touch.

"I want to get the puck, have possession, be able to make plays," Kobasew said. "It's a little bit different game down here than it is up there. I don't know what my role will be yet on this team, but yeah, just try to fine tune those things and get my game back to where it should be."

Although it came nearly a decade ago with Lowell, it's worth noting that Kobasew's last AHL experience was a positive one. During the 2004-05 lockout, he, Eric Staal, Colin Forbes and Mike Zigomanis were among the league's scoring leaders. Staal, Cam Ward, Chad Larose and Mike Commodore won the Stanley Cup with Carolina the following spring.

"There were a lot of guys that were early in their careers with that team and we all kind of embraced it," Kobasew said. "That was a good development opportunity for all of us. Looking back on my career, that was one of the (most fun) years of my career. There was no NHL. No one was going up. We focused on what we had there and we had a good season."

For one, the Penguins are bringing in undrafted free agent Conor Sheary of UMass-Amherst. A 5-foot-9, 175-pound forward, Sheary averaged about 10 goals and 30 points in each of his last three college seasons and was the team's co-captain as a senior. He is expected to come in as an amateur tryout this year and sign an AHL contract for the 2014-15 season.

Also, the Penguins returned winger Tom Kuhnhackl and defenseman Harrison Ruopp to the ECHL's Wheeling Nailers.

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